VIJAYAWADA: The Forensic Expert Committee constituted by the State government to ascertain the cause of Hotel Swarna Palace fire, which claimed 10 lives, has ruled out the possibility of electric short circuit, not withstanding the claim of both Ramesh Hospital and the hotel management that short-circuit in the electric panel at the reception counter resulted in the mishap.
In a major fire that took place in the Covid Care Centre (CCC) run by Ramesh Hospital in Hotel Swarna Palace on August 9, 10 patients lost their lives and 20 suffered injuries.
The State government constituted a district committee headed by Krishna Collector A Md Imtiaz, the health committee headed by Aarogyasri CEO A Mallikarjuna to study the operational procedure of CCC and the forensic committee headed by Fire Services Department DG Md Ahsan Reza to find out the reasons for the mishap.
During the course of investigation, two teams of Forensic Department officials examined the hotel premises twice and observed that there was no sign of electric short circuit at the scene.
The committee opined that the fire might have occurred due to negligence of the hotel staff and presence of flammable material at the reception counter.
The failure of the hotel staff to extinguish the fire soon after it broke out, might have been another reason for the spread of flames to the entire premises within no time, the committee felt.
It also found that the intensity of fire was high in the reception area, lobby and another room adjacent to the reception counter as insulation of some electrical cables at busbar was completely burnt. “This could be due to external heat effect and the absence of ‘crater and shattering’ effect indicated that the fire did not occur due to explosion,” the committee opined.
It also came to a conclusion that the hotel staff might have deleted the CCTV camera recordings intentionally to cover up their negligence.
“Busbar and MCB switch panel got tripped, which indicated that no short circuit occurred,” the committee stated, adding that no bead formation was found on the burnt copper wires.
When contacted, fire officials told TNIE that they have asked the hotel management to submit the entire electrical panel diagram and specifications for further investigation.
“It has been more than three months. But the hotel management has failed to submit the specifications and other details of electrical equipment in the hotel. We have served notices on the hotel management in this regard,” said a senior official.